My Immortal: The Full Story
by August1
Summary: Hmmm. May change rating later. This is the full story behing the songfic. *Chapter One up*
1. Default Chapter

_This is the full story behind the songfic that I wrote to "My Immortal" by Evanescence.  I fell in love with Ginny and Draco's beginning and decided to write a full fic to expand upon the plot.  This will not be **pretty all of the time.**_

**_Disclaimer: _**_I do not own any of J.K. Rowling's characters, obviously, nor do I own any places that you'll recognize.  Any additional characters, places, and this plot are mine.  **I only say this once.**_

**_Dedications: _**_This story is dedicated to **SycoCallie** for reading every chapter of my other fic, **Eventually,** which I will update, I promise!  Also, this one goes out to **Amethyst Jackson** for being my HP and political hero.  Even if you think you hate H/Hr pairings, go read her stuff.  It changed my mind._

**_And now, the story….._**

My Immortal

Prologue

                He sat alone by the window, engulfed in darkness but for the tiny sliver of moonlight that played a stripe down his profile.  His normally playful personality had been subdued since before his arrival and was maintained through the duration of his visit.  He tried to hide it, and he might have failed had his two best friends wanted to see the truth, which they hadn't.  They knew that he was inwardly scarred, of course, but he laughed every day, played enthusiastic games of Quidditch with the family, got into a soap suds fight while helping with the dishes.  Yes, he had smiled quite a bit and his friends were relieved upon making this observation in a rushed, private conversation, interpreting this to mean that he was alright.

                But he wasn't. 

                He wanted to die.

                And no one wanted to believe it except for the unlikely pair of brown eyes that now watched him from a distance.  

                It was the middle of the night; everyone except the burdened young man by the window and the empathetic girl watching him was sleeping.  It had been that way every night for two weeks now.  Of course, she hadn't spent every evening watching him.  She wasn't _that obsessed.  No, she wasn't obsessed at all…just worried…just shaken from the dreams or visions? she kept experiencing._

                She contemplated approaching him, knowing that her presence would be rejected and appreciated all the same; now all she had to do was decide how to deal with the rejected part.  It wouldn't be the first time; it wouldn't be the last.  She watched his back stiffen and realized that she couldn't leave now, even if she wanted to.  He had already sensed her presence.  

                She took a deep breath and approached him tentatively, on tiptoe.  She raised a delicate hand to place it on his shoulder, and she noticed that his oversized shirt had slipped down a little, offering her a view of his bare skin.  Her hand hovered above his skin for a moment.  His voice startled her out of her mission and she dropped her hand back to her side.  He sighed.

                "What do you want, Gin?" He sounded tired.  She didn't want to bother him, but oh! she knew that he needed someone to talk to.

                "I watched you today, you know.  And not just today, the last couple of days, actually," she began.

                "And how is that a new thing?" he spat, annoyed.  He turned to face her and she could see the contempt in his eyes.  She was scared for a minute, but the fear passed and she straightened her posture.

                "I refuse to allow you to be mean to me, Harry James Potter!  Just because I _used to have a crush on you does __not mean that I do now, nor does that have anything to with why I'm here!"  He shrank at the fury in her eyes, then watched in wonder as they softened._

                "Anyway," she was calmer now. "I-I just want you to know that I pay attention, Harry, th-that I know that you're not doing well, and…"

                "And what, Gin?" 

                "And that I'm not afraid to see what's really going on with you, what my brother and Hermione choose not to see."  She did place her hand on his shoulder this time and she felt him shiver, whether from her touch or the cold, she really didn't care.  "I know that you're still hurting over Cedric's death."

                At the mention of that incident, Harry forced a swallow down around the lump in his throat.  He turned his face back to the window so she wouldn't see the tears, if he did, indeed, start to cry and ultimately embarrass himself.  

                "Ginny, I know you mean well, but, gah!  You can't understand what I'm dealing with!  All of a sudden, I've got these crazy emotions, this, this….hatred! And I can't stand myself for it!"  He slapped his hand down hard on the windowsill in frustration as he stood up and whirled back to face her once again.  He was struck all at once by her unwillingness to back down or avert her brandy gaze from his.  She was right.  She wasn't afraid of him.  And something about that upset him.  

                She just looked at him, knowing that he was evaluating her strength, and therefore, her right to be standing before him offering an escape from the burden of one.  His face had grown longer somehow, filled out more.  There was maturity in his emerald eyes that held a full other side effect emotion…was it malice?  He had grown taller over the summer, no longer dwarfed by Ron, and his muscles had become a little more toned.  He was still skinny, but he made up for that in the way he carried himself.  

                She felt her eyes start to waver, and she broke the intense stare.  She tried to speak, but had to clear her throat in order to not sound like someone who had cried all night.

                He watched her lips as she parted them to speak.

                "Harry, I know it's hard to not hate.  Maybe you want to hold onto the hate; it will give you motivation and strength to take on Voldemort, no?  So you tell yourself to keep it in your grasp, to only use it to fuel your mission…"

                "So?  What's your point, Ginny?  What do you know about these things?" He tried to go around her but was stopped by a firm press against his chest and a soft determination in her eyes.

                "The very hate that you want to use will turn you to the side that you want to defeat."

                The unexpected statement was more than he had dreamed could come from this small figure.  He was hit hard, and he stared, mouth slightly open, and pondered her wise words.  She was correct, of course.  It was a statement that he would have expected from Hermione, never Ginny.  She seemed too out of the loop, too innocent, too bloody _young_ for that kind of insight…and he was intrigued.  She lowered her head, mistaking his silence for malice and guilt washed over him as he struggled to understand.  She was the only one who _really got_ his introvertedness this summer.  But _how?_

                "I was in the chamber, you know.  I did terrible things to my friends, well, Colin anyway, he was my only friend then…and I looked up to Hermione.  I know how it feels to have hurt people in ways that you cannot control.  Anyway, Harry, I'm sorry that I bothered you. Maybe I have some sick passion for helping lost puppies or something of the sort; I don't know.  But I know that I'm not wanted here.  I don't even know why I try anymore.  If you don't want to talk to me, fine.  I don't care.  But I hope that you find something to channel everything into, anyway."  For a moment, there was silence.  Then the quiet was broken by the Muggle clock downstairs that rang on the hour.  

  "Happy Birthday, Harry."    

                He wanted to apologize, but she was already gone.  He knew that he'd hurt her, and he was sorry.  He wanted to tell her that her words had made sense, made him feel comforted, but he couldn't; for one, she had just gone into the loo and shut the door, and for two, her words had also scared him.  She did have passion for things, relentlessly so.  But there was a morbid side to her that he had failed to understand until this very evening.  He had seen it before, and scoffed at it, blaming that as the reason that he didn't bother to be better friends with her.  But he knew that he could trust her; that perhaps, she might be the only one to understand this side of him.  

                His desperate hold on that thought was what calmed him enough to enable him to sleep that night.

                He woke that morning to shouting.  He looked over to the other bed in the room, and noticed that Ron was still sleeping.  The Weasley's had always been a loud bunch, and over time, he'd gotten used to it.  For the first time in days, he managed a small but genuine smile as he decided that he would tell Ginny all that there was running through his mind in relation to the incident that past June.  He had just closed his eyes again when shrieks pierced his ears, presumably from Molly Weasley.  She sounded hysterical.

                "Oh my!  Oh Merlin!  Arthur!  _Arthur!" _ Harry peeked his head out of the door and watched Mrs. Weasley slump to the floor, hand covering her mouth, and continued shrieking.  "Oh, my little girl!  _My little girl!_" she repeated.  At this, Harry came running down the hall toward Molly who was staring in shock through the open door of the loo.  Harry turned to see what had her so scared, and he nearly vomited.  

He heard Hermione's cry behind him.  

                "Someone get her out!  She might still be alive!  Oh, Ron, MOVE!!  Oh, I'll do it myself!"  And Hermione ran into the bathroom frantically.  Harry quickly joined her at the side of the tub.

                Between the two, they hauled Ginny Weasley's pale, limp body out of the bathtub filled with bloody water.  

A/N: I know that this is not only a short chapter, but it's bloody morbid, sorry.  I also know that there's no Draco in it right now, much less D/G, but it HAS to be so in order to properly set up the story.  Harry will not be a mindless bumbling idiot in this piece, either.  I refuse, heh.  The next chapter is longer and really begins the story…Please Review.  Also, if you REALLY want to please the author, please go read "Eventually…" Give it a whirl.  Ginny really doesn't come in a lot before chapter 6, but it is a complex story…so do me a favor?  Please?  shameless plug


	2. Chapter One

                Chapter One

                For two months, they had made excuses. 

                "_She, uh, she caught Muggle pneumonia," Ron would lie._

                "_She'll be back soon," Hermione hoped._

                And none of them knew what it would be like when she did return, or how to avoid the subject of what made her snap.  In fact, neither Harry, Hermione, Ron, Fred, nor George even _knew what made her snap!  All of the Gryffindors and even a few Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs sent her flowers and letters and singing cards via owl…but none of them knew that the owls' destination was St. Mungo's.  _

                So far, Harry was the only member of the "Weasley" family that hadn't gone to see Ginny.  He'd stay in front of the fire in Gryffindor tower and clench his fists as he mentally accused himself over and over.  He'd been the recipient of Hermione's disappointed frowns and Ron's indifference.  If his friends hadn't noticed the difference in his attitude earlier that summer, they surely saw it now.  

                It had been different with Cedric's death.  Sure, he had lost any chance to date Cho, but the guilt he had felt was on a totally different level.  Cedric and died because he was Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived.  As far as he knew, the last person that Ginny had spoken to was Just Harry, Ron's best friend.  And in Harry's opinion, that was worse.  He balled his fists.  Why did his existence yield so many hurts?  Then it hit him.

                Maybe Ginny had felt that her presence was too much; hadn't he, Ron, and Hermione told her to go away more than once and not include her?  Harry was beginning to understand how she must have felt.  Because though Ron and Hermione hadn't stopped caring about or hanging out with him, he'd been the blatant object of many whispered conversations.  _Is this how Ginny felt?_  

                But it seemed that perhaps the fog was lifting; Ginny was being released, and as far as Harry was concerned, the nightmare would soon be over.  He wouldn't have to hear Ron cry into his pillow at night or see Hermione bury herself in her homework even more so.  

                Perhaps when Ginny returned, he would just be happy that she was alive and forget the fact that he was the last person she talked to before attempting suicide.  

                Then again, he would probably just have to hope that Ginny kept that fact a secret.  

                Ron and Hermione had no idea that Harry Potter was responsible for this tragedy, and he intended to keep it that way.  

~ ~ ~

                Ginny took one last look around the room that had been her home for the last two months.  She felt fresh from the first unsupervised bath that she just got out of.  This room on the 3rd hall of the psychiatric ward was a nice little room, with lavender walls and a cute little window shaded with spring-yellow curtains.  It was cheerful, and a welcome change from the narrow bed upon which her life had been saved.   She had been confined to 24 hour watch for the first two weeks and met with a Muggle psychologist for the better part of the day.  She had wondered at the presence of a Muggle in a wizard's hospital, and had learned that there was an actual alliance between the Muggle and Wizarding world for purposes and cases such as these.  

                Oh, how she was _weary_ of the doctors and their questions.  She squinted in the mirror, noting that her hair was longer but needed a trim, and though her eyes had never been full of life, the sparkle that had been there was gone, leaving a dull, empty, and _old_ presence instead.  She tried to button her long-sleeve shirt and scrunched her nose when she realized that she'd have to leave it open; there were curves now where there hadn't been before, thanks to the Muggle antidepressants she was on…they made you gain weight.  

                But she felt…decent.  At first, they had to watch her to make sure that she'd eat.  She thought that her avoidance of food would force them to see that she just needed to go to Hogwarts!

                _Hogwarts.  So far, Harry hadn't been to see her.  Dumbledore had given the Weasley children, Harry, and Hermione permission to visit her every weekend, and, at first, she hated it.  She was so out of touch with everything, but at the same time she was painfully aware of Ron's teary eyes and Hermione's lack of words.  Fred and George were always telling her funny stories about her friends.  But Harry's absence was always evident.  Though, she didn't blame him for not coming.  Not one bit.  _

                _Her eyes fluttered open for a moment.  The absence of color startled her, hazy and swirling as it came into focus as a stark white room.  She tried to sit up, but she heard someone gently tell her no and softly push her back down.  She turned toward the voice and saw emerald green and raven black…then lightening…no, something lightening-shaped.  The look in the emerald was a reflection of hers: fear.  _

_                **Gin, I'm sorry, I, I, the voice tried, the insecure tone sounding so familiar.  She licked her cracked lips and spoke, her voice surprisingly clear.**_

_                **Harry, oh dear…Harry, I…I'm not dead? she questioned, though she knew the answer.  Hurt flickered in his eyes.  ****I didn't mean to, Harry.  I didn't.  Tell mum and dad for me.  **_

**_His jaw clenched as his fingers ran over the bandage covering her wrist.  She saw him then, as she so often did, and she gave a little smile.  He peered at her strangely and she understood._**

_                **It's not your fault, Harry.  It's no one's, I don't even remember doing it…I'm tired.  'Night, Harry.  He worried when her eyes closed, but, seeing that she was breathing normally and just sleeping, he dropped his forehead to her forearm and cried softly, guilt filling him to the core…**_

                And that was the last time she had spoken to him.  Well, the doctors rendered her sane and said it was safe to go back to Hogwarts.  Then she'd see him and make him understand that it wasn't his fault, that she still loved him like a brother, and maybe confide that she was confused herself, that she didn't remember picking up the knife…and that perhaps the dark shadow she had seen in the bathroom before she passed out wasn't just her imagination.  

                "Virginia?" Merryl, her nurse questioned.  She turned, and Merryl smiled.  "Why, don't you look a pretty picture?  Look at those curves!  I daresay you'll have the boys at Hogwarts competing for your affections soon," she said with a twinkle in her eye.  Ginny smiled, and it felt _good.  Her insides felt completely warmed, and her outlook became optimistic.  She sharply turned her head toward the sound of footsteps on concrete. _

                "Ginny?  Oh, my little girl!" Molly came running and Ginny felt her eyes begin to fill.  She threw herself into her mum's arms and the two Weasley women sobbed.

~  ~  ~

                "Father, are you aware that this is one of the few weekends that I have to explore Hogsmeade?"  Lucius, sitting with impeccable posture, glared subtly at his son.  He drummed his fingertips against the oak table in an aristocratic beat.  

                "Yes, Draco," he drawled.  It was entirely evident from whence Draco's tone came. "Do you have a point?"  Across the table, Draco swirled his brandy in his goblet and raised his eyebrows as he took a languid sip, letting the alcohol coat his tongue like velvet, savoring the taste and purposely making his father wait.  He smoothly set the goblet's base back onto the table.

                "What makes you think I want to spend my day with you?" He asked.  The drumming stopped.  He watched the candlelight dance across his father's scowl.  The eyes that mirrored his own narrowed as Lucius leaned over the small space that separated them, practically nose to nose with his son.  

                "Draco," he whispered in a deadly tone.  The one being question sighed, making the appearance of being bored.

                "What?" he didn't bother trying to mask his irritation.  

                "I will not tolerate any insolence from you," Lucius growled.  Draco raised a brow.  "Watch your tone, boy, or you may wake up one morning to wolfsbane in your tea."  Lucius moved gracefully back in his chair.  "And what is it that you are drinking?  Brandy?" He didn't wait for an answer.  "The last thing that you need right now is to be an alcoholic.  I did not raise my son to drown himself in self-pity."

                "No, father, you didn't raise me at all, actually," Draco said.  Lucius smirked.  

                "Draco, enough.  Listen to what I have to say, and then I will leave you to your pathetic amusement.  Neither of us wants to be here, and that is all very well.  Put on a smile and a happy charade for all those watching, and keep the appearance."  Draco pasted on a fake smile.  

                "Thank you.  You are surely aware that you are almost 16, yes?"  Draco cocked his head to the side. 

                "No, father, I'm not.  When is my birthday again?  Is it that day when I get all of those presents?  Or the day when I get whipped once for every year I've been alive?  I can't remember."

                "Silence! You are surely asking for a beating.  I will say this once.  On your birthday, find the floo system in the kitchen, and floo to Hogsmeade.  Apparate from there to the Manor's grounds.  Be ready to be respectful and be initiated__"

                "Or I will be tortured with the Cruciatus and possibly killed." Draco finished in an immature, sing-song voice.

                "Do NOT interrupt me when I am speaking to you!" Lucius' control wavered, and the Three Broomsticks got quiet.  Every eye was on them. 

                "Do not disappoint me, _boy_," He said authoritatively.  Clouds met steel as the Malfoy men stared one another down.  The glare was broken as Lucius whirled around almost with a whistle, and strode out of the pub.  Draco reached up and raked his hair defiantly, deliberately messing it up and slouched in his chair, gulping the last of his brandy.  

                "Rosemerta!" he yelled.  She appeared almost instantly, looking none-too-happy about it.  

                "Child, if you yell for me one more time," she threatened emptily.  He raised his glass. 

                "I want another." He stated simply.  She shook her head.

                "Absolutely not.  I will not be fired for allowing an underage wizard get drunk in my care!"  He went to open his mouth, but her hands flew to her hips.  "And I will not be bullied into it, either!  You get on out of here, Mister Malfoy.  Go on."  He just stared, mouth agape, as she literally _shooed_ him out with her hands.  He stood up proudly, though inside, he was raging.  Draco slinked out of the pub and was almost to the door when he saw Justin Finch-Fletchly run into the pub, and the Hufflepuff shouted to his housemates.  

                "Ginny Weasley is coming back today!"  Draco shook his head, confused, and sneered at their jubilance.  He had heard that she was ill, at least, that was the rumor.  As far as he was concerned, that was one less Weasley he had to be disgusted by.  As he walked down the street, he found himself looking toward that old rundown shack where Lupin had gone to wait out his wolfing period and thinking about taking up residence there…he smiled at the thought and decided to check it out, when SMACK! He collided with someone, knocking them both to the ground.  He sat up immediately, and scowled when he saw that the perpetrator was Potter.  

                "Why are you here, Potter?  Isn't your girlfriend coming home today?" He spat.  The insults came naturally to him.  But to his surprise, Potter didn't say anything.  And the last thing that Draco remembered before losing himself in the blackness was feeling like he'd been hit by the Hogwarts Express.     

a/n: sorry it took me so long to update!  The first chapter is always hardest for me…*sigh*.  Thanks to purus.flere, Marina Pearl, Fallen Angel of Darkness, and Crystal  for all of your reviews, and please leave me more! I'm insatiable, heh.  

**_   *august*_**


	3. Chapter 2

                I would have laughed if it hadn't been so pathetic.  If he had been joking, mocking in his tone and having a good chuckle over the fact that the Dark Lord had indeed kept plotting for his Great Revival like a two-pence "magician" who kept trying to wow the unimpressed crowd with relentless, unimaginative tricks, I could have participated.  But the old fool was pitiful in his blind devotion, vulnerable in his belief that everything would return to the way it was 17 years ago, before Voldemort's fall.  Puffed up by the expectation of a position of leadership at the Lord's right hand and in his favor.  Utterly clueless.

                I didn't fear my father the way he expected me to.  My understanding of fear derived from the idea that you had to pay someone enough mind to respect them, and I didn't respect my father.  He was a joke.  And unfortunately for me, I was the only wizard who saw him that way.  The rest of them worshipped him.  Saw his callousness as the perfect attitude.  Except for Arthur Weasley; however, that Muggle-lover only saw so far.  He saw his ambition, his wit, his cunning, and he knew that Father's dark affiliations would be the death of him one day, but he didn't recognize the truth of what father was; weak.  Yes, _weak_.  

                Father reared me to believe that weakness is not to be respected.  This is why I do not respect him.  He was weak in his wholehearted devotion to half-breed Tom Riddle.  It did not allow him room for an ounce of himself; he had given _everything to someone else.  _

                Though I didn't respect him, I loved him.  

                Regardless to what you may have heard, Malfoys are capable of loving.  It is just…different from others' ideas of love.   And it's sporadic.  Highly, highly sporadic.  My father loved my mother instantly, the moment they met, really. And then, two years after they married, he started to follow Voldemort, creating terror in exchange for power, for a chance to get back at all of those who outranked him.  His relationship with my mother evaporated from lingering caresses nightly to an emotionless coupling every couple of months.  My mother drove herself insane, quite literally, questioning what she had done to make him hate her…and then I was born, and he seemed to come back to her.  Until Harry Potter defeated Voldemort.  Lucius suddenly stopped answering my cries at night and instead told my mother to quiet me by dipping her finger in brandy and letting me suck.  I imagine that that is why I love brandy so much; it comforts me.  

                And these are the things I think of when my world seems to crumble.  That I have not only endured worse; but survived.  

                And not only do I survive, but I get better-looking every day.  

Although I stopped acting out after Professor Moody turned me into a ferret, I am still the arrogant son-of-a-bitch I have always been; I just internalize it except when Ron Weasley (yes, I _do_ know all of the Weasley children's names; how could I not?  They are the offspring of my father's worst enemy) makes some idiotic comment, or Harry Potter's-well, anything that had to do with Scarface _angers  me for some reason.  I feel as if I must speak to him, otherwise, the rage I feel might present itself in more…embarrassing ways.  _

And though I show him mercy by not uttering a spell to make him choke on his tongue, I hate him.  

I don't hate the Mudblood that much; she just annoys the hell out of me.  Though I do imagine she'd be quite the feisty one in bed.  The quiet, seemingly naïve ones are usually the most loud and violent; particularly the first time they are taken.  They lose all reservation and inhibitions and just surround themselves with the sensations…but I digress.

And that thought is what I woke up to, in the dark, dank hospital wing.  My head pounded, and I saw blurry shapes with a white luminescent outline, like they were shining, and then everything came into focus.  There was still a throbbing at my temples, and I fought to keep my eyes open as Professors McGonagall and Snape approached the foot of my bed.  McGonagall kept her eyes straight on mine, piercing them all the way back to the retinas, while Snape surveyed my entire being, taking into account all of my injuries (for it felt like there were thousands!).  When he was through, he took a step backwards, an unusual smirk flying across his face and then leaving just as quickly. 

"Mr. Malfoy," Professor McGonagall's thin lips parted.  "What you said to Mr. Potter was inexcusable," she said.  I just squinted my eyes so they wouldn't hurt so badly and took my verbal lashing like a man.  "In case you are wondering, there was quite a crowd around to hear what you had to say to Mr. Potter.  I daresay that if he hadn't taken a swing at you for what you said, someone else would have."  I pressed my lips together to keep myself from talking back; I hadn't said anything _that terrible._

"There are…_circumstances surrounding Ms. Weasley's absence these last two months that made that remark highly inappropriate."  Snape stepped in, his sentence speaking of mysterious things, as per usual.  I licked my lips, then opened them to speak._

"What's my punishment?" I asked, making sure to sound bored.

"You will make a public apology to Mr. Potter and Ms. Weasley for insinuating that they are something that they're not."  My brows furrowed, my face scowling automatically.

"What?!" I couldn't keep the incredulity out of my voice.  "I just called her his little girlfriend!  There wasn't anything even remotely insulting!" I defended myself.  

McGonagall narrowed her eyes; a frightening sight since it made her look like a blind rat after just being born.    

"Very well, Mr. Malfoy; have it your way.  You may resign your position as seeker on the Slytherin Quidditch Team," she gave with a curt nod.  I knew when I was defeated, and I knew that my beating would be worse, should I lose my position on the Quidditch team than it would be if I chose to publicly humiliate myself by apologizing to Potter and Weasley.  

"No, no ma'am, I'll apologize," I grumbled.  At her raised eyebrow, I added,  "And I'll look sincere about it."  She nodded.  

"Tomorrow morning, Mr. Malfoy."  And she turned and left.  When she was out of earshot, I mumbled something very unkind under my breath.  Snape almost laughed; then his face turned very grave.  

"From now on, Mr. Malfoy, you might want to make sure that your body is in somewhat of a—less aroused state when you have professors come talk to you," He drawled.  I looked toward my groin, and sure enough, my sheets were tented.  I felt a blush crawl up into my cheeks; I knew what that erection was from…_Damn those dreams!  I growled and turned over onto my stomach, thinking all the while that I had never been more embarrassed in my life.  _

~  ~  ~

                It was softer than the rest of my skin, smoother.  Absently, my fingers traced the scar that was concealed by a glamour charm.  My fingernails had grown out in the last couple of weeks, much to mum's delight.  Of course, the orderlies had to cut them for the first 5 weeks or so, to prevent me from doing more damage to myself, they said.  I felt so strange now.  To be out of the hospital, I mean.  I'll never forget the look on Mum's face when she came to get me from Saint Mungo's.  There was no time for a reunion with my family; besides, I just wanted to get back to Hogwarts and put this crappy chapter behind me.  My arrival is a blur, I still don't fully recall the details.  My housemates, sweethearts that they are, threw me a party, and unfortunately, all that I remember is being drawn into what seemed like thousands of arms, and hearing, "Welcome back, Ginny!"  millions and billions of times.  When the crowd parted, I looked expectantly for Harry…but he wasn't there, surprise, surprise.  Hermione took my hand and I allowed her to lead me to my room.  When we arrived, she sat me down on my bed, then rummaged through my drawers, nervously unfolding and re-folding every item that I owned. I sat with her in silence, happy for the break from the noise. When she had creased the last pair of (very virginal!) knickers, she slammed the drawer and, shaking, finally turned around to face me.  I looked at her expectantly, for there was no doubt in my mind what would come next out of those trembling lips.  And I was correct.  

                Wringing her hands, Hermione asked me the one question I didn't know how to answer.

**A/N Hey guys!  I am sooooo sorry about the delay, I've had this chapter written for ages, but I moved and didn't find my disks until tonight.  So, here's this chapter….and the next will be soon.  Take Care, and thanks to all who stayed with me.  **


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